Last Thursday I got up early and took the 5:45am Acela Express from Providence to NY Penn Station for a full day of the most interesting conference I’ve been to in many years. It was TALKERS Magazine’s annual New Media Seminar, where some 350 talk radio stars and producers shared their view of where the industry is headed. And I loved every second of it. I won’t even try to give you all the detail of the day, but I will give you a few nuggets that relate to our business at Backbone.

First, the First Amendment is still a ball in play, and we got that message from all sides. No less than Sean Hannity, Ed Schultz and Gov. David Paterson impressed upon the crowd that boycotts and retaliation are uncalled for when the listener can easily “change the dial”. Of course, our Internet radio “dial” now allows for thousands of choices, with each of those stations having virtually unlimited freedom of expression. Which brings me to my second point, Tom Leykis.

The persistent message all day was that talk radio is changing right before our eyes, whether it’s in slow motion or as a blur. That technical change is the transition from terrestrial to the Internet. The operational message is that nobody’s job is secure in traditional radio, you must prepare for the change now. “Don’t expect to drive to work and park next to the building with the tower. The tower will be gone, and so might you.”

Panelists and talk show hosts Lionel and Tom Leykis talked about the importance of career preparedness, and it was Leykis who was the day’s most specific panelist about this subject. He tells us that while you still have a job in traditional radio you must get to know your sponsors and accumulate a database of your fans, because you will wish you had done both when you are out on your own, trying to start up your own station, like he did. He told me later he took a couple of years and created his own station the hard way, not the Backbone way. But he succeeded, and Leykis represents the future for many of the future-looking panelists and conference attendees.

In another session, talk radio consultant Holland Cooke was, as you would expect, full of great ideas and tips on how to bring more people to your Internet radio site and station. We were all warned not to try to take notes while he presented, because he threw more at us than we could keep up with. (“If you work on-air, at a local radio station, your job, as-you-know-it, is toast.”) The first thing I did when I got back on the return train home was to buy myself a bunch of hyphenated domain names to increase my SEO. You don’t understand? Contact me, or better, Holland, at talk-radio-consultant.com and ask him.

Because of conflicting vacation plans, I won’t be able to attend the October version of this Seminar in Los Angeles, but we won’t miss out. George and Paul will be there for sure.

You should, too.

P.S. Michael Harrison, CEO of Talkers announced at the beginning of the Seminar that this would be the last “New Media” Seminars, because he’s been hosting them for 15 years, and this media is no longer “new”. It will henceforth simply be called Talkers Seminar. Meanwhile, I notice in today’s news that Blogworld Expo is just now changing its name going forward to NMX, New Media Expo.